Did Your Teacher Insult You First? Details About the Brawl at Charents School

On February 18, a brawl occurred between a physical education teacher and students at Charents High School No. 67 in Yerevan. This was reported by the newspaper ‘Hraparak’. The news was confirmed in a conversation with the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the school itself. The Investigative Committee stated that a criminal case has been initiated regarding the incident under Articles 195, parts 2.3 and 2.5 of the Criminal Code (inflicting harm or committing other violent acts against a minor by a group of individuals), and Article 297, part 2.1 (hooliganism manifesting disrespect towards society or openly disregarding legal or moral norms, which has resulted in an affront to a person, insults or indecent expressions, or disturbs public peace by demonstrating a blatant disregard for rules of coexistence).

Margareta Sargsyan, the director of Charents High School No. 67, mentioned in a conversation with the publication that rumors are circulating online claiming that the teacher assaulted the students, while in fact, the opposite occurred. “I would like to say that the physical education teacher is one of our best teachers. He walks into the school with his head down today, and for what reason? The children argued during a long break, and the teacher, who is a 27-year-old male, I truly value the presence of male teachers in our school, attempted to resolve the argument. He intervened and admonished them, saying it was inappropriate and that they were big boys now and should not behave like that. During this conversation, another student from the 9th grade, who has behavioral issues, intervened disrespectfully and challenged the teacher, saying, ‘Is your teacher even real?’ and started insulting him, after which five people assaulted the teacher. There was a significant fear that the argument could continue outside, where things could end much worse, which is why we contacted the police,” the school director stated.

“Not everyone is aggressive, but there are aggressive ones as well. The environment, society is aggressive, resulting in such situations. Out of 770 students, there will certainly be some aggressors. The family also plays a very important role. Nonetheless, the classes continue. The teacher has returned to his job, although he is disheartened and broken by the occurrence of such an event. However, we are trying to find means to rectify the situation. Regarding the students who assaulted the teacher, we issued a notice during the pedagogical council meeting, but what does that piece of paper mean to them? We are trying to understand how to bring the children to our field. But the school alone cannot have an impact; there must be cooperation between the school, teachers, and parents. A tripartite cooperation is necessary to achieve results,” the school director concluded.